shellfish

English

Cooked mussels

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English schellefyssch, from Old English sċielfisċ. Equivalent to shell +‎ fish.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈʃɛl.fɪʃ/, [ʃɛɫˑfɪʃ]
  • Audio (Southern England):(file)
  • Audio (US):(file)
  • Hyphenation: shell‧fish

Noun

shellfish (countable and uncountable, plural shellfish or shellfishes)

  1. A fisheries and colloquial term for an aquatic invertebrate having an inner or outer shell, such as a mollusc or crustacean, especially when edible.
  2. A culinary and nutritional term for several groups of non-piscine, non-tetrapod, aquatic animals that are used as a food source. The term often exclusively refers to edible aquatic crustaceans, bivalve mollusks and cephalopod mollusks; but sometimes echinoderms may be included as well.

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